The Usain Bolt of window cleaning is a 69-year-old man from Clacton called Terry Burrows. “What I’m doing, people half my age can’t do,” Burrows tells me over the phone. This squeegee samurai, who now has a stent in his heart following a heart attack nine years ago, is the Guinness World Record holder for the fastest window cleaning on the planet. “You don’t just do this,” he says. “You train to do this.” As he gears up for the 2025 Window Cleaning World Cup, Burrows is wondering if anyone will be able to take his shiny crown.
In the niche world of competitive cleaning, Burrows is something of a hero. He calls himself “Terry Turbo” and has appeared on TV consistently since the mid-Nineties, setting world records left, right and centre. A lifelong cheeky chappy, he is a gift to media broadcasters and has popped up on Heart Radio, This Morning and The One Show. (He was programmed with Usain Bolt, whose management, Burrows says, didn’t want him to go head-to-head in a window cleaning contest with Burrows.) He even wrote and released a song called “Bucket of Love”. “Terry’s a bit of a legend,” fellow cleaning professional Kevin Robson tells me.
